http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/14/ bigfoot-dna-results-final_n_2681135.html
http://baltimorepostexaminer.com/ melba-ketchum-to-release-high-definition-video-of-sasquatch/ 2012/12/13
http://doubtfulnews.com/2013/02/ ketchum-bigfoot-dna-paper-released-problems-with-questionabl e-publication/
http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/02/ bigfoot-genome-paper-conclusively-proves-that-sasquatch-is-r eal/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2280424/ Texas-vet-Melba-Ketchum-claims-DNA-bigfoot.html
Clovis Man FYI, Clovis Man was a paleo-indian group of homo sapiens. Not a different species of hominid. Lastly, let me clarify why I was saying the "DNA evidence" is bunk: Without having a second species to interbreed with, it's unlikely that a "wooly human" species could emerge. That second species would have had to have been either in asia or America, and would have been much more ape-like than ours. The physical differences would most likely make any hybrid non-viable, meaning, sterile. What this means, is with so much genetic diversity between our species and this proposed "sasquatch", would require a very large amount of time for it to evolve. The fact that Dr. Ketchum is claiming that this species became genetically distinct from humans approximately 13,000 years ago is difficult to support, given what we already know about genetics and the fossil record. Putting it at roughly 13,000 years ago would firmly place them in America, and would mean that the number of genetic mutations (which are constant, and trackable) would place them well within the range of homo sapiens. If there were such a homonid offshoot, they would be less distinguishable from someone of arab descent to someone of european descent, considering the geographic isolation of those groups has been in place tens of years longer than your supposed Sasquatch has. I'm not trying to insult you, Xooxer, just trying to point out why it's a bitter pill to swallow, given any basic knowledge of how evolution ACTUALLY works. I'll believe it when we have solid evidence, and when deliberate bigfoot hoaxes stop being more prevalent than valid, peer reviewed scientific research on the subject. But as it stands, not only would such a discovery completely upend our understanding of sentience, it would also completely unravel the very scientific field that your "Dr. Ketchum" has supposedly used to prove their lineage, and it would completely throw all of our understanding of every other species on the planet into the dark. Either your bigfoot creature didn't evolve by the same biological mechanisms that every other creature on the planet did, or the research that shows that they split from human beings 13,000 years ago is dead wrong. I'm going to go with the latter, because frankly, genetics is one of the best ways to prove that evolutionary biology is in line with the yardstick of reality, and you cannot use these techniques to reach a valid answer that disproves the self-same techniques' validity. | |
Magicsofa wrote:
Xooxer wrote: No, actually that's speculation. Desperation is what you're all clinging to. Glaciers don't mean that all fossils suddenly disappear, This is my fault. I should know better than to assume people on BYOND are capable of thinking. Allow me to do the hard bit. A fossil is only created under unique circumstances. Of the countless individual living beings ever to roam our planet, only a fantastically small fraction are preserved. All of these methods of preservation require luck and time, often eons. Certainly, there are methods of preservation which are more quickly brought about, say, in the processes which occurred at the last glacial maximum which seemed to flash-freeze large vertebrates in blocks of ice, but these methods require extreme circumstances largely unseen on Earth, except in very rare instances. I'll refer you to this little article on how fossils are formed for a more thorough explanation. http://www.fossils-facts-and-finds.com/ how_are_fossils_formed.html Also, glaciers scour the landscape clean, leaving behind rubble and bare rock. Any deposits would likely have been either lost in the thaw, or ground into dust beneath the ice flows. and since the last glacial period ended about ten thousand years ago, there's been plenty of time since then to leave something behind... It's been a blink in the geological timescale it takes to form fossils. So, no, there hasn't been plenty of time. | |
Airjoe wrote:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/14/ bigfoot-dna-results-final_n_2681135.html You see, this is exactly what I mean when I state that you people aren't capable of thinking for yourselves. You don't even have the presence of mind to form your own words, or to even borrow the words of others. You'd rather just point and grunt and call that well and good. What a pathetic retort. Since most of the arguments put forth in those articles have already been addressed, or are in other ways unaddressable, I see no further reason to humor your contrivances. | |
Ter13 wrote:
Clovis Man You are correct. I was mistaken in claiming Clovis was related in any way to this issue. I can only say that I wanted to wrap up an already long post as quickly as I could, and coherency was sacrificed for expediency. Lastly, let me clarify why I was saying the "DNA evidence" is bunk: On what are you basing this statement? It's known that humans have "hairy" mutations from time to time. Check out this wild and crazy wiki article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypertrichosis That second species would have had to have been either in asia or America, and would have been much more ape-like than ours. The physical differences would most likely make any hybrid non-viable, meaning, sterile. o_0 Wait, what? Let me see if I have this. You're saying that in order for there to be a Bigfoot, you first have to have a Bigfoot? Or, are you saying that a pairing of man and ape can only make a non-viable child that must then "evolve" to be viable? You know individuals don't evolve, right? I'm not sure what you're getting at, to be honest. The fact that Dr. Ketchum is claiming that this species became genetically distinct from humans approximately 13,000 years ago is difficult to support, given what we already know about genetics and the fossil record. How so? If a species became genetically distinct from another yesterday, since any day is as good as another to be distinct, it's not a new species? How many days are required to pass between genetic distinction and your ability to recognize a new species? Putting it at roughly 13,000 years ago would firmly place them in America, Wow. Yeah, I can see how that makes total sense, since, you know as well as everyone does, that no continents except America existed 13,000 years ago. Wait, we're talking North America, right? We all know South America was off partying it up with Europe in Magic Fairyland at the time. and would mean that the number of genetic mutations (which are constant, and trackable) would place them well within the range of homo sapiens. I think I see where you're taking this Straw Man... What's his name, by the way? I know, we should call him Harry. If there were such a homonid offshoot, they would be less distinguishable from someone of arab descent to someone of european descent, considering the geographic isolation of those groups has been in place tens of years longer than your supposed Sasquatch has. This is a swell place you got here, Harry. Do you take all the boys here? Seriously, though... Arabs and Europeans don't have large hairy apes swinging in their family trees, Bigfoot supposedly does. I see no reason to think it wouldn't resemble an amalgamation of the two species. I'm not trying to insult you, Xooxer And I do thank you for that. , just trying to point out why it's a bitter pill to swallow, given any basic knowledge of how evolution ACTUALLY works. Actually, you might want to actually go see how that actually is, actually. I'll believe it when we have solid evidence, and when deliberate bigfoot hoaxes stop being more prevalent than valid, peer reviewed scientific research on the subject. Now, you see, I have a problem with this stance. You can't simply rubber stamp every claim of evidence as a deliberate hoax and then glibly deny any solid evidence exists. You just dismissed the evidence as a hoax because you have a preconceived belief that it must be. That is not science, that is religion. But as it stands, not only would such a discovery completely upend our understanding of sentience, Now that sounds like a really interesting state of affairs. I would have no qualms upending our understanding. Would you? it would also completely unravel the very scientific field that your "Dr. Ketchum" Um, quotes? Really? Now she's not a P.h.D.? She's a "Doctor"? I have to ask, why did you do that? Was it a deliberate attempt to discredit her by implying that she's not a "real" P.h.D.? has supposedly used Well, I guess that answers my question. -_- She didn't do the sequencing herself. Numerous independent labs and universities did. If anyone "supposedly used science", it was people like Kalzar there working on an unknown bio-sample. I have to hand it to her, there. It would have been a real battle trying to discuss this if she did the work herself. to prove their lineage, and it would completely throw all of our understanding of every other species on the planet into the dark. I don't know about all that now. I think we have plenty of wiggle room to allow a new hominid into the fold. Either your bigfoot creature didn't evolve by the same biological mechanisms that every other creature on the planet did, or the research that shows that they split from human beings 13,000 years ago is dead wrong. Or, your understanding of what's being presented here is a little out of whack. I'll go with that option. I'm going to go with the latter, because frankly, genetics is one of the best ways to prove that evolutionary biology is in line with the yardstick of reality, and you cannot use these techniques to reach a valid answer that disproves the self-same techniques' validity. This doesn't disprove DNA sequencing's validity. I don't even understand how you can claim it does. Oh. Right. Harry that Straw Man. | |
All this is false. You can't prove it for yourself.
| |
Xooxer wrote:
This is my fault. I should know better than to assume people on BYOND are capable of thinking. Allow me to do the hard bit. You should know better than to assume that people will convert from their own sensibilities to yours when you are throwing ad hominems at them. | |
A WILD BIGFOOT APPEARS
| |
Xooxer wrote:
She didn't do the sequencing herself. Numerous independent labs and universities did. If anyone "supposedly used science", it was people like Kalzar there working on an unknown bio-sample. I have to hand it to her, there. It would have been a real battle trying to discuss this if she did the work herself. I know you keep on saying this but I want to make sure you understand the independent laboratories do the grunt work and run the data, they return a piece of paper with their findings. The person requesting information draws conclusions based on their findings. The independent laboratories don't draw the conclusions. Therefore, Dr. Ketchum received information from these laboratories where they would have said the DNA is skewed thus unable to draw proper conclusions. She then went on to conclude that was because she discovered hybrid DNA when in fact she discovered muddled, contaminated DNA. | |
Magicsofa wrote:
You should know better than to assume that people will convert from their own sensibilities to yours when you are throwing ad hominems at them. What's good for the goose.... But you're right. Although, I'm not trying to change anyone's sensibilities. I just want to talk with someone... Anyone... intelligently about stuff I find interesting. It's simply amazing to me that none of you care to join in in any meaningful way, save for a few brief instances. The only discussion anyone here seems to care to have is either A. how crazy I am for finding these topics interesting enough to discuss publicly, or B. how the topic is against their beliefs. I hope you can appreciate my frustration with all of you. | |
Kalzar wrote:
Xooxer wrote: Yes, I am aware of the process of transaction. She's buying the data processing, not the summary. That still doesn't disprove anything. Therefore, Dr. Ketchum received information from these laboratories where they would have said the DNA is skewed thus unable to draw proper conclusions. No, they don't draw conclusions, remember? They return data. It may be interesting or nonsensical to the individual lab rat, but their conclusion is irrelevant. She then went on to conclude that was because she discovered hybrid DNA when in fact she discovered muddled, contaminated DNA. I guess we'll just have to wait and see, won't we? Funny, though. In a more recent interview (I'll see if I can find a link later), she claims that some of the portions of nuclear DNA resembled that found in lemurs. If that's true, I think it's more than a case of human contamination. Either way, she claims she can prove there's no such contamination. | |
Xooxer if it makes you feel any better I believe you.
:) | |
Xooxer wrote:
I'm not trying to change anyone's sensibilities. I just want to talk with someone... Anyone... intelligently about stuff I find interesting. Xooxer also wrote: We have proof. There are countless hair samples and casts of footprints that show consistent features. most people's encounters end with 'something' throwing big rocks at them. Big rocks. Ancient native American tribes have plenty of stories about their harry brothers in the woods. I doubt Tonto was hoaxing his tribe back then. The paper has been peer reviewed, passed and published. Bigfoot exists, and it's either a human hybrid, or mutated descendent. and after people showed skepticism: maybe I've just overestimated the intelligence of this community | |
Xooxer wrote:
Magicsofa wrote: I have not said you're crazy, nor did I say it's against my beliefs. I do believe in supernatural/unexplained phenomena but part of my job when I do research is to be skeptical about scientific data that both I observe and from what other people write in papers. We're all human are all prone to fallacies and even peer-reviewed journals have gotten ideas wrong numerous times. Can you understand my frustration when I point out fundamental errors with her methodology and you still refuse to see why they discredit the whole study? You're not going to understand because you believe so strongly that this evidence proves something that you want to be proved. Similar to Dr. Ketchum believing her own evidence, I don't think she's conning anybody, I just simply think it's good old fashion confirmation bias. | |
I refuse to believe in this! But I do feel that governments are hiding things from the people.
~Ripper man5~ | |
Ironically, this 'debate' demonstrates quite well the necessity of proper peer review and emphasis on a well-explained, thoroughly scientific methodology.
I say 'debate', because usually in a debate both sides attempt to acknowledge and understand the arguments put forth by the other side. I think Kalzar in particular has been quite nice about that. I don't really see that happening from Xooxer, no offense intended. The humor of the situation is compounded by the fact that the author of the paper starts their own scientific journal to publish an article, that they charge $30 for. And as Kalzar has alluded to, this also means she was responsible for selecting her own group to peer review the article. At best she truly believes what she's published. At worst its a money scheme and a complete breach of trust towards those who trust and believe in scientific journals, which is far worse than the $30 charge. As an academic this disgusts me. :) | |
Alathon wrote:
The humor of the situation is compounded by the fact that the author of the paper starts their own scientific journal to publish an article, that they charge $30 for. And as Kalzar has alluded to, this also means she was responsible for selecting her own group to peer review the article. At best she truly believes what she's published. At worst its a money scheme and a complete breach of trust towards those who trust and believe in scientific journals, which is far worse than the $30 charge. I think she believes in her work, because as Xooxer mentioned, she has been working on this study for 5 years and was established before (disclaimer: I didn't search her on pubmed so I'm not sure how established she is nor do I know what qualifications she has if she has as a forensics vet). There have been numerous scientists who have staked their careers on theories and published articles demonstrating them but all it takes is one piece of evidence to disrupt it and then all the work is proven wrong. If you guys ever get a chance to go to a scientific symposium you'll see how confident some of these researchers are about their theories. But for every person that believes wholeheartedly in their research when they present their work at the conference, there will be a dissenter who believes they are wrong just as passionately. If the dissenter is confident enough, then you may see a fight. Both of them yell at each other during 400+ person conference. Science is brutal. Also: http://doubtfulnews.com/2013/03/ ketchum-update-might-as-well-be-lemurians-at-this-point/ A sample she used was from some hunter who claimed to kill 2 Sasquatch creatures and when the sample the hunter had analyzed it showed a bear and human DNA (his DNA). That's how easy contamination can happen. Now the DNA lines up more with a lemur than a ape? She mentioned also that her findings contract Darwinian evolution. Come on. That's almost as bad as saying evolution doesn't exist as it is perhaps one of the most consistently verified theories out there. You need to have real hard proof to come out and say Darwinian evolution is wrong. | |
Kalzar wrote:
Can you understand my frustration when I point out fundamental errors with her methodology and you still refuse to see why they discredit the whole study? Honestly, no. I see no reason for you to be frustrated in the least. I have yet to see any fundamental errors you have pointed out. I have seen speculations and false statements which you use to state her work is bunk, but nothing you've stated is anymore definitive than anything she's stating. You're not going to understand because you believe so strongly that this evidence proves something that you want to be proved. Um, what? I believe evidence proves something? Isn't that what evidence does? Similar to Dr. Ketchum believing her own evidence, I don't think she's conning anybody, I just simply think it's good old fashion confirmation bias. Or, God Forbid, she's convinced because the evidence she has is convincing? | |
Alathon wrote:
Ironically, this 'debate' demonstrates quite well the necessity of proper peer review and emphasis on a well-explained, thoroughly scientific methodology. What debate? I'm not debating you people. I'm pointing out this lady's work, her statements and what evidence she's released publicly. You're trying to argue with me about it, pointlessly, I might add. Peer review is only an effective practice if all people involved practice it honestly. Dishonest reviewers can kill a paper without having to answer for their review. They can, as happened to Dr. Ketchum, dismiss the paper on it's premise alone. That is not science. That is religion. I say 'debate', because usually in a debate both sides attempt to acknowledge and understand the arguments put forth by the other side. Again, I'm not debating this. If you'd like to have a proper debate on the existence of Bigfoot, we can do that instead. I think Kalzar in particular has been quite nice about that. Nice? What's nice about making false claims and speculation without even bothering to hear what this lady had to say? I know he didn't bother to listen to her interview by the statements he's making, especially on the topic of contamination. I don't really see that happening from Xooxer, no offense intended. None taken. I never said I was nice. The humor of the situation is compounded by the fact that the author of the paper starts their own scientific journal to publish an article, that they charge $30 for. Um. See, now you're doing it. She didn't start this journal. And as Kalzar has alluded to, Falsely. this also means she was responsible for selecting her own group to peer review the article. No. Let me say it *one more time*, since it's gone completely over everyone's head. The review was completed before she acquired the journal. She bought the publication because she didn't want to lose the passing review because the lawyers pitched a fit over the subject matter. At best she truly believes what she's published. No, at best the paper is truly evidence of the existence of Bigfoot. At worst its a money scheme and a complete breach of trust towards those who trust and believe in scientific journals, which is far worse than the $30 charge. Yeah... How does that math work out? What's a forensics career and a science journal compare to a $30 fee for a few downloads? That is crazy talk. Would you ruin your good name in order to sell a paper for $30? Many journals charge for their articles. You're not accusing Science of money grubbing, are you? If it really is that important to you that the article be free, then go pirate it and share it with the world. As an academic this disgusts me. :) Oh come off it. You're disgusted by your own belief about what is true in this situation, and what isn't. You have no real knowledge, and I would wager, don't care to even educate yourself. You believe this is all a put on without any evidence to support your belief. In short, you're disgusting yourself. | |
Come on man, I like fantasizing about undiscovered creatures as much as the next guy, but this is just desperation. Glaciers don't mean that all fossils suddenly disappear, and since the last glacial period ended about ten thousand years ago, there's been plenty of time since then to leave something behind...